


the tales we tell

by fuzzy_paint



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-02
Updated: 2013-02-02
Packaged: 2017-11-27 21:30:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/666700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzy_paint/pseuds/fuzzy_paint
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thor reads tales from Midgard in order to feel closer to Jane.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the tales we tell

**Author's Note:**

> Part of the 100 Fairy Tale prompt table: _the bridge to another world_ , prompted by hariboo.

When he has been back on Asgard for longer than he was ever on Midgard, Thor finds the book. The binding is hard, the paper thick under his fingers. The pages smell old, though Thor knows it truly cannot be, not when compared to the length of his days. 

But perhaps to a mortal.

He does not know how it snuck into his belongings, who might have put it there, or if there was even a reason for doing so. He cannot think of one, practical, mischievous, or otherwise; perhaps it is Fate. 

The words are strange to him, incomprehensible. The Alltongue may allow Thor to speak the mortals’ language, but he cannot read it. It is as foreign to him as the stars in the sky, but they are Jane’s words, just as in his mind, the stars are now Jane’s. He would know its contents. 

He may not know the words, but Thor knows the depictions. There is one of him early in the pages, hair gold and body surrounded by lightening, Mjolnir in his hand. His quest remains unclear, as if it is more important to show him than the battles he has wrought, the glory he has earned. That in itself is unlike any of the sagas told at the feasts of Odin’s court. It piques his curiosity. 

There are more. Flipping through the pages, he finds Odin and Frigga, Sif and the Warriors Three. There are depictions of the frost giants, surprisingly accurate, and then those that are less so, those of the other peoples of Yggdrasil. The book is filled with people he does not recognize and has neither a name for nor a connection to. They seem important, though, to rate a depiction where there are so few. 

There is one of Loki; his gold horns and green armor telling. The expression on his face is more familiar than Thor would like, so much so that he hesitates to visit his brother as he had intended for that afternoon.

 

 

Later, after the daily feast, he picks up the book again and looks at the pages once more. The words are stark and black, but the color of the pictures faded and simple. He turns over Jane’s book – for it is truly Jane’s. Even if the images suggest that it is not a book of her people, it is a book of her people about him and his. He wonders what it says, what Jane sees when she thinks of him, what stories of him she knows.

He would like to know the stories of her. 

He pauses on one of the pictures of him and of Loki. In it, they are young but it is hard to tell in the style of Midgardian art. Certainly they must be older than the recent events of their history; the book is older than that, but the anger in his brother’s face rings too true with the Loki who speaks rarely, and only does so with the tang of bitterness on his words. What do these tales say about him? 

He could ask the court magicians to weave him a spell, but this book is the only tangible connection he has to her; despite the sturdy binding and hard cover, it feels too fragile, and Thor is reluctant to share it with them. 

The part of him that sees Loki as brother-friend first, the part of him that cannot forget that once Loki would rarely deny him anything, does not see the foolishness in the request until he cannot take it back.

“My magic is dying, _brother_ ,” Loki says, hands fisted in his lap. “And you ask me to weave you an enchantment that allows you to be closer to _that woman?_ ” 

If the barrier allowed him to work his spells as he truly can, Thor is certain Loki would throw a deadly enchantment at him. Barring that, perhaps the chair he sits on or the pillows from the bed where he sleeps. But it is one way only: Loki cannot send anything through except his glares and his words, dripping in vitriol when he condescends to spare them for Thor. 

Thor cannot speak quickly enough, sincerely enough – though sometimes he wonders if insincerity would work where his honesty has failed, but Thor does not have the talent or the heart for such deception – to keep his brother close.

Loki retreats to the dark shadows of his cage - despite the trappings of his rank, the gilt comforts of a prince of Asgard, Thor knows that this is truly a prison and Loki sees it as nothing else - and refuses to look at Thor, no matter how he cajoles, not even when he leaves.

The book remains illegible. 

 

 

“She is well,” Heimdall says, as he always says. Thor does not visit every day, but it is near enough. Thor only asks a moment to look her way, see her well, and to banish the seedling of doubt that her search will end incomplete. It is unfound; it must be unfound, for Jane will search for the Bifrost until the end of her days if need be, and Thor will wait until she finds it, or until another path opens up. 

The whole of him desires to know more, to know how her quest fares, to know everything about her, but there is unrest in the realms. With the Bifrost broken still, they cannot afford to turn their eyes away. They cannot afford to be caught unaware. 

And truly, perhaps Jane would not welcome it, though she must know that Thor wishes for an end to her quest. He wants victory for her. 

He wants her, if she will still have him. 

 

 

He has other duties, attends to them diligently, matters of state and those of a warrior of Asgard, but the book is not forgotten, just as Jane is never far from his thoughts. 

Sif senses his distraction, seems to understand it in the way that Sif has always understood him, and works him twice as hard in the training rings. Sweat and dust are familiar companions to him, as is Sif, and though he holds the Warriors Three dear, lately he favors Sif’s company over that of theirs. 

His mother lets him sit quietly with her, the silence welcoming and not accusing or nearing poisonous as it is when he visits his brother. Loki has not yet forgiven him for his careless request. Thor does not know if Loki will ever offer him that, not when he treats Thor’s offers of forgiveness as insult.

He has other duties, and he attends to them, but his heart lingers elsewhere. 

 

 

Several days pass before he thinks to venture into the library. For some time, he simply wanders, touching the spines and reading the titles. There is an order to them, and there must be a way to find what he needs, but this was always Loki’s domain and never Thor’s.

Eventually, he has to ask for guidance. The books on Midgard are few and far between. They are hundreds of years old, ill-used and forgotten in the nearly lost corners of the room. One falls apart in his hands when he takes it off the shelf, pages breaking apart, tales disappearing into fractions of what they once were. 

He is more careful with the others. He has hands for wielding weapons, for strength and for battle, but gentleness is not the abstract concept others might suspect of him. Particularly not when he thinks of these books as things of Jane. 

His people’s language has not changed all that much since these words were written and many of the tales still ring familiar. He has heard them in song, half-listening at feasts. He reads about the great Jotnar siege of Midgard and how Odin led the warriors of Asgard into battle to chase them back to the froze waste of Jotunheim, and tales older still, those of the first frost giant Ymir, who, combined with the culmination of his own sorcerous acts and the blood spilled upon his death, gave birth to both the Jotnar race and the realm of Midgard. Such is why Laufey sought to conquer it a millennium later, to reclaim what he considered his birthright, and perhaps explains why Loki might do the same. 

He has never thought about the warriors of Midgard that fought against Laufey’s invading army before. He does now. He has battled at the sides of some of Midgard’s mightiest and has thought to call them friend. Where are the tales of the Man of Iron, of the Lady Widow, of the great green beast locked away inside Bruce Banner? 

Are there tales of them? This tome does not mention them, but they are too recent for the books in his father’s library. He knows that. The mortals do not age as they do, and these books are older than their lifespans more than thrice over, but he wants to know their stories.

But these are not the tales of Midgard. They are tales of Asgard, and not what he wants. 

 

 

“If it will not pain you to part with it,” Frigga says, setting aside her sweet-honey tea, some days after Thor’s sojourn into the palace library. “Perhaps there is something I can do.” 

It is the way of mothers, Thor thinks, to know such things when he has not spoken of them. Not to her, not to Sif. Only to Loki, who refused to aid him, who rarely spares words for Thor at all. At first, he had not imagined that Loki might be the same with their mother, but the days when Frigga visits Loki are always visible in the grief around her eyes. 

His mother would like Jane. He is sure of it. And she is his mother, and he remembers gentle hands and soft words before he remembers her rank, and so it is acceptable to lend her Jane’s book. 

His anticipation of what she might return costs him two battles in Sif’s sparring ring, but perhaps his full attention could not have won them either. He does not regret Sif the boasting rights, though she does not take them. Perhaps because she senses his distraction and is unwilling to claim victory when he is not at his best. Such is the way of Sif. 

His father calls him to task only once, but even once is too often. 

Loki says nothing. 

In the end, it is three days before Frigga returns Jane’s book. In his eagerness, he cannot concentrate on the meal before them, staring at the book for long moments before his mother excuses him, an indulgent smile upon her mouth. 

Thor returns to his quarters, closing the door and the rest of the realm away. His mother’s spell-work lies tangible on the binding and in the pages, the spark of it familiar and comforting, but his excitement fades within the first page. They are not stories about Jane, as he did not expect, but had hoped. They are stories about Asgard. 

He does not read first a tale of Odin, nor that of himself, but one of Sif. First, he reads of when Loki cut her hair and sought the dwarves to weave a replacement. Then, it branches into another, one promising delight. He knows this story, one of Sif’s initiations in the Valkyries when she still sought their ranks, and it pleases him to know the mortals think her as fine a warrior as she truly is, but he only manages a few pages before Thor puts the book aside, the grip of true shock holding tight. 

Does Jane think this? She must know it not to be true. She must. 

He finds Sif where she oft to be found. The training grounds suit her far more than the intricacies of court life. The sweat on her brow and the fire in her eyes does fine things for her beauty. Thor has never truly looked at her so. She is his shield-sister, his childhood companion, his dear friend- 

He is not one for lurking in the shadows, watching, but Thor cannot bring himself to speak until she sees him, starts to smile in greeting, but then frowns, wary at his expression. 

The words sound funny when he speaks. “Did you know that the mortals think we are wed?”

She stares at him and he at her, and then by mutual agreement, they turn and head in opposite directions.

 

 

It is not in his nature to hide from conflict. Nor is it in Sif’s, but such a revelation deems separate space appropriate. At least for a time. He visits Loki who does not speak when he enters, who truly shows no sign of acknowledgement but for the furrowing of his brow. 

Thor settles in the chair he’s often used, and wary of the revelations it might provide, reads a tale of the Warriors Three. It is a grand old tale, if not told in the proper length, and perhaps not in exact detail, but one of when they rescued the ill-fated poet Bragi from the wilds of Asgard. He’s nearly finished when Loki speaks. 

“I have never seen you so studious,” Loki says, startling Thor into an easy smile. Loki has not spoken to him since Thor requested the spell from him. Before that, not since their last argument. And the pattern has held, arguments and then long, painful stretches of silence, since they’d battled over Midgard. One so talented with words should not stay so silent. There are times when Thor cannot think to bear this silent image of his brother.

He does not know when words became difficult between them. Was it before Loki’s fall or after? Before his Exile or after? Perhaps one day, their conversation will not be so stilted, but resemble what they once had, what Thor remembers they once had. And so there is joy in that, whenever Loki breaks this dreadful silence, but as always, it is gone too quickly. Loki’s mouth twists into a sneer, teeth bared like he threatens to bite. 

Thor shows him the cover of the book. “Tales from Midgard,” he says, and though Loki huffs and does not seem to want to talk much more than that, turning his face deeper into the shadow, away from the book and away from Thor, it gives him an idea. 

Thor reads half the story first. It is about Odin. He disregards it and turns to another. This one is about their mother. That, he feels, is safe enough. In Thor’s presence, Loki’s hatred extends to Odin and to Thor, it mars his words when he speaks of his former companions, thick and heavy the one time he spoke of Sif. None of that has yet to touch their mother, not in Thor’s presence. 

Thor clears his throat and begins. At first he pretends not to care if Loki listens or not, but it is easy enough to forget his brother: he does not know this tale. His mother weaves often, and with great skill, but he has never known her to weave the very clouds into rain or sun. Yet the tale claims it possible, even so far to suggest that she might weave the turning of the Midgardian year, when the short days and long nights of winter start to edge into spring. Is there truth in it or have the mortals formed this tale on their own?

He posits the question to Loki. The faraway look in his eyes fades, and the haughty glare returns. Thor wishes for a time before this, when Loki did not look at him with such hate. He wishes for a time when doubt did not linger in his heart, telling him that Loki would forever remain beyond his reach. 

Loki does not speak, as he rarely does, but his disregard for all things mortal remains clear. 

He reads on, some of the stories familiar, some very much not, but he continues to read though his throat has gone rough, dry without any drink to quench it. It would be rude to sate his thirst when Loki is not allowed fine ales and better wines. 

Eventually, Loki shifts audibly, vicious when he says, “I tire of your incessant babbling!” 

Thor turns a page without looking up. “Then you do not have to listen, brother.”

It is another story of their mother – Loki responds best, most, to those – and this one is about the Mother Night, of Baldur, the most beloved, the third son- 

Thor stares at the words until they are meaningless, incomprehensible once more. Loki has gone very, very still where he sits. 

They do not have another brother. Thor knows of none named Baldur. No lords or emissaries, none in his father’s court. 

Thor reads on in silence. He reads of his mother’s quest to beseech all things to amity with Balder so that he should not come to harm. He reads of mistletoe and of an arrow, of blind Hoder trusting too much, of the lying words of a Trickster. He reads and the words become meaningless under his gaze. 

“Thor. How does the tale end?” Loki leans forward, as if he’s sensed the dark turn to his own future. He has not strung so many words together in many days, and it cannot be. 

It cannot. 

“Thor,” Loki says. “Tell me.” 

Thor closes the book, not bothering to mark his page. “Perhaps we are done for the day.”

“You would run from this? You will not tell me the tale of a brother we do not have-“

“Loki, please.”

“Ah,” Loki says, eyes glittering. “You will not speak this tale but oh, I can well guess. You also do not tell the tales of me. Does it not concern you that the mortals have always known me as I truly am but you are still blind to it? Perhaps I shall thank your mortal when I see her next. If this is to open your eyes when nothing else has, then- Thor. Thor! You cannot run from this!” 

 

 

Loki is right in this. It follows him in his thoughts throughout the day, heavy in his heart. How can this be? The words must be false. 

They would be false, but Loki has tried to kill him thrice before. Is it truly such a stretch that he might seek death for another brother? A younger brother, one they do not have yet?

Thor cannot run from this. The words filling the book's pages are wrought with ill-omens and woeful tidings. What good can be gleaned from it? None that he can see. There is nothing of Jane here, but words aimed to incite doubt in his heart: the work of a Trickster. 

It bothers him that the thought does not ring as false as it might have once.

 

 

The midday meal, which he has become accustomed to taking with his mother, tastes of ash in his mouth. He shreds more of it than he eats. The book, tucked inside a pouch at his hip, sits heavy at his side. He thumbs the corner, then sets it on the table, his hand on top of it. 

“Have you read these words?” 

“It is a private thing,” his mother says. “What troubles you, my son?” 

He thinks to ask if another brother grows in her womb, but this is Asgard, and they do not speak of such matters. Not until the Lady speaks of it first. She does not seem to be with child, but perhaps. Perhaps. Could mortals see the shape of things to come? Where the seers of Asgard could not? 

If it where Jane to suggest such a thing, Thor would not hesitate to believe it. She is clever, far more than most of any realm, and seeks to heal what most of Asgard could not dream to accomplish. They wouldn’t even know where to begin. 

These tales cannot be true. These stories are wrong about his ties to Sif, they are wrong about a third brother, and so they must be wrong about Loki. 

But the mortals knew him as Jotnar when Thor did not, when all of Asgard did not. They knew his mother’s strength in weaving. He’d checked the tales in the library, not often told in the halls or during the feasts, but there is truth to them, more than he’d ever realized. 

They knew about Sif, and her trials with the Valkyries, the cutting of her hair, the fierceness of her in battle. Were they right about her feelings for him? His for her? 

Sif was never one to avoid any battle, even those such as this, and truth be told, neither is Thor. She finds him as he is seeking her. As one, they step away from the hall and the curious ears of any passing too near. 

They say nothing for a long duration. Thor has still not reconciled the knowledge of his supposed marriage to her, but if she is ready, or seeks more information, he will not deny her. 

“ _Married?_ ” Sif is almost violent in her tone, but the confusion is there, the shock is still there. Perhaps he only sees it because he feels it also.

Wordless, he opens the book to that specific tale and hands it to her. She takes it and looks at the words, frowns, but his mother’s spell holds true. She’s silent as she reads, her brow darkening when she reaches the part of the tale that Thor had stopped at. 

Sif is his dearest companion, his oldest besides that of his brother, and perhaps there might have been plans and perhaps those outside of them might hold certain suspicions, but truly. 

Truly, Sif is Sif and Thor is Thor, and he cannot imagine a connection different than what they already are. Truly, he cannot imagine his life without her, nor does he ever desire to. But-

But Sif is Sif, and she has never shown any interest of that sort; she has never indicated the wish for something different, something more. And he has never thought to wish it for himself. 

And there is Jane. 

“This is not true,” she says, closing the book. 

“I know,” Thor says. 

“It is not true!”

“I know,” Thor says again. Her irritation does not mystify him in the slightest. Sif holds little regard for those that might put her in a place she would rather not be, and even less for those that speak of the kind of future she has little interest in seeking. 

“Why would they think it? I have never…” Her glare turns soft, confused. She shakes her head, touches his arm. “Where it that our hearts turned that way…” Sif shakes her head again. “If such was the case, we would rejoice, but my heart. Yours. They do not-”

“Truly,” Thor says. Where her heart turns, she has never said, but he knows where his heart yearns to be. To think that Jane may never find her answers, it feels like betrayal. Jane will, he is certain of that, but how long? Time is different for him; Thor has never counted the days like he has since his separation from her. He knows now what it is for them to pass too swiftly. 

Sif takes his wrist, breaking him from his thoughts. He could pull free from her, though perhaps not as easily as he would like to think. Sif’s visage is fierce, her mouth determined. “You will see her again,” she says, and that is enough. 

 

 

Thor reads further on his own without his brother’s presence or without the possibility of unrequited hopes troubling him. Some tales of Loki bite at his heart; Thor struggles to complete them. These are tales of a brother who is no brother, and those of a sometimes ally, sometimes enemy to Asgard, whose motivation remain unclear. The person in these stories is unrecognizable as the Loki he has known for most of his life, but still too familiar for Thor’s comfort. 

Is this who his brother is to become? Is there truth to these tales, truth the mortals have seen but of which no seer of Asgard has spoken?

Again he reads of Loki cutting Sif’s hair, and that is true in substance if perhaps not in detail. He reads of the Jotunn theft of Mjolnir and Loki’s schemes to retrieve it, and he has no memory that Mjolnir has ever been stolen. He reads of the building of Asgard’s defenses and that certainly cannot be true. Loki is present in the tale, but Asgard had found her strength long before the time of either of their births, and the walls are more of magic than they are of simple stone. He reads of the stranger and his great horse that toiled through the long hard winter to build such a great wall, and Loki, in the shape of a mare, stole away the great stallion.

It is a clever tale, and one of the few that offers joy instead of sorrow, one that reminds Thor more of the brother he has long known. A Loki returning in happy victory is a cherished thought, and to return with such a great prize as Slepnir, who had once carried Odin into the realm of the dead and back, who- 

Thor lifts his head, struck by a growing suspicion, and stares at the wall, unable to read for some time. 

 

 

“I desire to know how you came by Slepnir,” Thor says, fingers tight on the ends of his book. Going to Loki for information is perhaps folly and promises futility, but Thor would know this from his brother’s mouth. 

Loki stares. He says nothing. 

Thor presses on. “You were gone for eight days and then you returned with him. He is a horse beyond compare, with no equal. Will you tell me the tale?” 

Loki eyes the book in his hand. His mouth thins. 

He says nothing. 

 

 

The stables are always busy, but somehow Thor manages to find Slepnir alone, with neither stable boy nor groom nearby. Thor offers the red-gold apple he’d brought with him, and Slepnir does not hesitate to take it. 

Perhaps it is not so strange. Thor has heard tales of such happenstance before, and he has never seen the ladies of Jotunheim. Perhaps the frost giants do not have mothers, or they are not like Aesir in this matter, as they are not in others. 

The book offers no more information than the few lines he’s already read, and Slepnir has very little insight to add, but there are stranger creatures and people stranger still. That he knows. 

It is not so strange. 

 

 

Heimdall’s gaze already seeks other realms when he speaks again. “She searches. She fares well, in the company of your companions.” 

Thor is pleased at that. Jane and his Midgardian shield-brothers! Such knowledge drives him to seek out his own companions and to dine with them as he has not in some time.

They spend the evening telling tales of their exploits and adventures, tales Thor knows as truth since he’s experienced them. They speak of returning the cracked Odinsword, their first quest together, of the justice they brought to Mogul for his crimes. They speak of the early days, and as all tales must be, they are exaggerated in the retelling, greater and grander the more they are told. 

But they cannot speak of these tales without speaking of Loki. Of his part in them and it drives them all to melancholy since it is unlikely they will have new tales to tell any time soon. They try to hide it, acting far more boisterous than any of them truly feels but it is clear that their remembrances have unsettled them all. 

Thor can see it with Sif, though it is well hidden; she keeps it, whatever has affected her so deeply, close to her heart.

But she has always read him far too well, his nearest and dearest friend save for his brother. She corners him as the others leave. In the face of her determination, Thor capitulates and brings out the book. 

“I fear these tales have a sense of Fate about them.” 

“They are wrong about me,” Sif says. “I love you dearly, Thor, but they…” Her mouth turns down, and Thor is mystified by it. What hidden thoughts does she hold? What memories does she see that he cannot? 

She holds the book close to her chest. “May I?” 

Perhaps it is best. 

 

 

Parting with the book leaves Thor cast adrift. Heimdall has little news of Jane, but much of the growing unrest in the realms. Reliance on the Bifrost has crippled them, both Asgard and the whole of Yggdrasil, in ways they had not seen until they were forced to. Much of the old ways of travel are lost, and there are many who would take advantage of Asgard’s loss. 

Thor consults with his father about the realm’s defenses; he trains with the warriors of Asgard, preparing for a battle he hopes will be averted. His father says nothing of the book. Thor hesitates to ask. Was it mortal counsel that led him to take Loki and raise him as his own? Had Odin seen the shape of things to come and sought to avert with that single action? Or had he bowed to Fate, as all men must? 

He keeps watch on his mother’s figure, as cautiously as he can. Does Baldur grow in her, even now? 

In his few moments of rest, he continues as he has always done, but now he visits Slepnir, who says nothing of Jane or of the realms beyond, or much of anything at all. Unlike Loki, he is always pleased to see Thor, particularly when he brings apples.

It is too soon to see Loki, even though days have passed, but Thor has not given up. Will not give up. Loki is his brother despite his true parentage, despite these Midgardian tales they might yet live. And if stares in a much too silent room are the only camaraderie they can ever achieve again, so be it. 

But Loki is not alone. 

Sif stands, foregoing the chair Thor brought in here long ago. She holds Jane’s book open in her hands as she reads him a tale of herself, one Thor has not ventured to read yet. He’s read about his mother, and some about his father but not anymore of Sif. 

“…I alone know, as I think I do know, your love besides Thor, and that was the wicked Loki.” She shuts the book with a thud, echoing loudly in the room, and they stand there staring and staring and staring. 

Thor stays where he is, standing in the doorway and entirely unnoticed, staring and staring and staring. 

“There are many things false in this book. This,” she says, “this, at least, holds true.” 

Thor reevaluates all he knew of his brother and his dear friend, tries to piece together this new information with his memories of them both, all in the space of a moment. 

He cannot. Why had she never said? Why hadn’t he? 

“I cannot.” Sif said.

“Naturally-”

“Hold your tongue! I am not done!” Thor has seen her fierce in battle, has seen this visage when all seemed lost. To see it now, to see her as if she does battle with Loki, now, even separated by the barrier of his cage, is to know that Loki has wounded her more deeply than Thor ever realized. Perhaps even more than Loki has realized. 

His dear Sif. His dear brother. 

“You have tried to kill him.” She gestures with the book. “If these words are true, you will try again.” 

“Forgive me for attempting to part him from you,” Loki says; the bitterness of his words is familiar, even if Thor hears them in new light.

“I love him dearly,” she says. “This is true and will always be true. But I will not wed, not anyone, unless I cannot bear the lack.” She touches the barrier between them, and Thor cannot see her face. But he sees Loki’s. And he hears her voice. “Perhaps one day I can forgive you for what you have done to Thor. But this. What you have done to me, this void in my heart? I do not know if I can forgive you for that.”

Loki says nothing and Sif says no more. When she turns, she is flushed. In anger or sadness, weariness or something far closer to defeat than Thor prefers to see on her. Has ever seen on her, truly. She slaps the book against Thor’s chest as she passes. He does not choose to follow her. If Sif needed him, she would request him. 

He stays with Loki, his brother who still says nothing, who looks as though he might never say anything again. It is battle-worthy, if not entirely honorable, to press his advantage at Sif’s revelation, when Loki is vulnerable. That is the way of any battle, though it saddens him to think of this as such. 

“I understand action,” Thor says. “Words have forever been your domain, one where you excel. I do not. I do not know how to reach you. I do not know where you have gone and I. I fear I cannot follow.” 

Loki’s jaw clenches and his fingers fold into fists. 

“I wish I could meet you at a point between, perhaps.”

So Thor opens the book, clears his throat, and begins, from the very start, to read. He does not skip tales, nor does he filter them out. But together they hear all this mortal book offers. Thor reads until the day is far past done, until his voice begins to rasp, until he must sit. 

Throughout it all, Loki says nothing. 

His expression flickers when he reads of each of them in turn. It changes when Thor reads of Slepnir, but not enough for confirmation or denial, and so Thor still lacks the truth of what the mortals suspected there. It does not matter, he decides. He reads again the story of their mother weaving the very sky, and blushes furiously when he repeats the tale Sif read earlier, wondering again why neither of them had said anything. 

He falters on the story of Baldur, words dying in his throat when a man named Hoder holds an arrow taut and ready to fly. He does not want to continue. He will not–

Loki’s eyes look wet. “Finish it.”

And so Thor tells the tale of how Loki slays Baldur, the most beloved brother. He reads of the punishment, the venom dripping into his wounds, the kindness and love of a lady named Sigyn, whom neither of them has met yet. 

He reads until the book is done.

The tales speak little of Midgard and absolutely nothing about Jane; Thor still does not know if they are meant to be true. But when he looks at his brother, what his brother has become, he fears that they might be. 

When he leaves, the book remains behind, pushed through the barrier. He does not know if Loki will destroy it or tear it to shreds and somehow banish all the remains. If he will read it again, all on his own. 

Though he continues to visit every day, Thor does not mention it. Nor does he speak of Sif, or Jane (there is little to say of her despite how Thor wishes that was not the case), or of the larger situation of Yggdrasil. 

Some days, Thor does not speak at all. 

 

 

Some days, Loki does. And though it is not what it was, it is enough.

 

 

The Bifrost mends suddenly, and rather violently. The bridge leaps from Midgard to Asgard, grasping the connection and holding fast. And for too long, until the earth of the realm begins to shake, trembling at first in a timespan too short to cause much damage, and then longer and longer, rattling the entirety of the realm. 

When it stops, Jane is in Asgard. He does not see her from his rooms, but he knows in his heart what has happened. 

Thor runs the entire length of the bridge to what’s left of Heimdall’s post. Jane is already examining this end of the Bifrost, working her science in ways he hopes he might one day understand, but she turns when he nears. 

He scoops her into his arms, twirling them both around and around and around. Thor lacks the eloquence to tell her how immeasurably glad he is to hear her laugh, but the joy in his heart must shine through for she holds him back just as fiercely. Her joy is evident by the smile she cannot contain. 

There is not time to sequester them from the curious eyes of Asgard. He must first present her to his father’s court and then begin to introduce her to the wonders of Asgard so that she might come to love his home as he has hers. During all of it, Jane is a little wide-eyed, and a little flustered, but she holds strong, as he knew she would. Thor takes her hand anyway, simply because he wishes it. 

He is more than glad to feel her presence at his side. 

His mother startles him when she whirls Jane away as soon as they are introduced, leaving Thor aimless and more than a little startled. 

He has not missed a day with his brother, not since they read together, so while his mother has absconded with Jane, Thor sneaks some of Loki’s favorite foods down to him, bilberries and the thin, flat bread of Asgard and a soft cheese to spread on top. He pushes Loki’s portion through the barrier, and they eat together, mostly in silence. It still weighs on him, but at the very least, it is not as painful as before.

Loki does not look surprised when Thor tells him of Jane’s arrival, but says little of it. Thor has suspected for days that he is not Loki’s only constant visitor anymore (excluding their mother and their father, of course), so it does not astonish him that Loki already knows. 

They do not say much of her, though he finds it hard to contain the words, finds it hard to concentrate on anything but the knowledge that Jane is here, in Asgard, that Jane is within reach.

Before Thor leaves, Loki kicks the book over to him, pushing it through the barrier between them. 

Thor stares at him, ignoring the book at his feet. There is a light in Loki’s eyes that Thor had thought he might never see again, one that reminds him of the times they’d worked Loki’s mischief and pranks together. 

As he heads out the door, Thor thinks to bring Jane to see him, eventually. Depending, of course, on both Jane and Loki’s agreement for the meeting, but his heart thinks it will be sooner than he expects.

 

 

Then there is the feast, more opulent than is typical. Such as Jane deserves, just as she deserves the finest bards in Asgard. His father has done well, to choose the tales they sing, that of Yggdrasil’s beginning and how she grew the Bifrost and taught the Ancients how to nurture it. 

He can tell Jane is brimming with questions throughout the entirety of the telling, and Thor promises her time with the bards who know the tale better than he. They talk of her science mostly, and the things he wishes to show her while she stays in Asgard, and of the companions they share on Midgard.

His friends mean well, but they occupy Jane’s time when he would wish it for himself. Fandral asks after the Lady Darcy and Volstagg after the denizens of Puente Antiguo. Hogun says little, but he always says little. It is Sif, in the end, who distracts their companions and allows them a measure of privacy so they may sneak away. 

 

 

He presents the book to Jane when they are finally, finally alone. Much later, of course, when they have been alone for some time and the sweat has cooled from their bodies.

Propped on his side next to her, he watches her face as she takes it. 

“I’d hoped we’d gotten more wrong than right,” Jane says, turning it over in her hands. 

“Yes,” Thor says. “I hope that as well.” 

She sets it on the floor by the bed, and he thinks to tell her the repercussions of the book, that Loki sometimes offers Thor a smile that, while strained, lacks the viciousness he has seen from his brother for too long, of all that the book has wrought, that he does not wish those tales to come to pass, but instead he confesses his hope that it might tell him of her. And his disappointment when it did not. 

It is better, he thinks, to hear it from her than to read her stories in a book. To know them as the truths she speaks instead of the hopes and fears that linger in hearts. 

She touches her knuckles to his chest, watching as she traces the lines of his chest, and begins to speak of her love for the stars. That is nothing new, but Thor had not known the hows and whys of it, and so he keeps quiet, listening as she speaks of how she first looked to the night sky and fell in love, and then she speaks of her theory, and how she hopes to apply it now that she has experience the fact firsthand. She eventually tells him of how Darcy fares, of her father and mother, of their mutual companions, talking long into the night as the candles burn low. 

One day, he knows, they will tell the tales of them.


End file.
